please donate

Sturgeon’s Mill is a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization.

There are many ways your tax deductible donation can help our working museum continue to offer visitors and students the opportunity to “Step Back into History” at Sturgeon’s Mill. Contributions can be: check, credit card, cash, stock transfer, or estate bequeath. To donate by credit card, debit card or paypal, click on the "donate" button at the bottom of this website.

The Ultimate Redwood Log-to-Lumber Raffle

If you can’t find that special custom-cut tabletop, beam or special dimension lumber here’s your chance. We will be raffling a beautiful coastal-grown redwood log from a tree that was blown down in our recent storms and donated to us. It will be on display for your appraisal on our old 1927 Federal logging truck. The winning raffle ticket holder gets to be the sawyer of the raffle-log and mill it into whatever dimensions are desired. This is a unique, one-of-a-kind, special gift for the person who has everything.

Historical Equipment Donations

We are looking for direct donations of historically related artifacts from the 1890’s – 1950’s such as hand tools, steam engines, old vintage trucks, and milling equipment. Right now we seriously need an additional boiler to power our expanding collection of steam engines and milling equipment. Specifications for this boiler, or steam generator, are that it needs to be able to be diesel fired, 150 hp. and needs to be able to produce a 150 lb. head of steam. Got one or know someone that has one? Please contact us.

Boiler Fuel Donation

Our present boiler is always hungry for more diesel. Think of the boiler as a giant tea-kettle. It hungrily consumes fuel to heat water hot enough to make the steam that drives the sawmill’s steam engines. On an average demonstration run it burns $700 - $800 of diesel. In the past, construction companies and farmers have helped us by donating some of their diesel fuel to keep our boiler steaming. This is an on-going need.

Student-crafted Furniture Raffle

This year we donated wood to the Brookhaven middle school wood-shop program. Students crafted furniture which will be on display for another raffle opportunity to support our Student Education Fund.

Hand-crafted Furniture Raffle

Furniture raffles offer a chance to take home hand-crafted furniture made by our crew members from unique pieces of redwood milled at our sawmill.

Donate to our Student Education Fund

Donations to this fund will go into a separate account designated specifically for funding bus transportation for schools that have no money available for field trip transportation. It costs the school districts $600 to provide a single school bus trip to get 40 students to our sawmill and back to their school. Several districts in Sonoma County cannot afford this expense. Please consider making a donation to our Student Education Fund to buy a full or partial bus trip to help these students “Step Back into History.”

Stock Donations

Sturgeon’s Mill has an accountant available to advise you about direct stock transfer options to our 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation and the possible tax advantage to you. Contact Matt Bardella at Bardella & Associates 707-829-4800.

Legacy Gifts and Significant Donations

A Legacy gift is a once in a lifetime gift to our working museum. It comes as a designated donation from one’s estate. Legacy gifts and significant donations have given us the resources to start reuniting the original property of the mill as well as financing major repairs and acquisitions.

When we began restoring this sawmill, some 30 years ago, our footprint of land was ½ acre which was barely enough space for the mill to sit on. Over the years larger gifts from benefactors and Legacy gift donations have enabled us to acquire adjacent properties for our museum helping to reunite some of the lands of the original Sturgeon’s Mill. Today we have expanded our museum’s footprint from the original ½ acre to 15 acres, allowing us to create ample parking for our visitors and to purchase Wade Sturgeon’s famous “Woodland Gardens”. Our working museum’s goal is to acquire more adjacent properties as they become available and to reunite the original lands of this sawmill.

Significant donations and Legacy gifts will be honored with the donor’s name, or the name of a person they’d like to honor, on an engraved brass plaque mounted on an antique 60 inch saw blade which holds a place of honor in a quiet spot at the edge of the gardens. If you have a friend or family member you wish to honor with a generous donation, we will place their name among the other worthy donors on this ancient, mighty saw blade of recognition.